Broken: Part 2 of 3: A traumatised girl. Her troubled brother. Their shocking secret.. Rosie Lewis

      ‘We’ve sent him to Chess Club. He was happy to go and we thought we could use all hands on deck for now.’

      I gave her a grim smile and walked past her into reception. The plump, round-faced receptionist stood up from behind her glass partition as soon as she saw us. ‘Would your daughter like to play with me for a few minutes?’ she asked, smiling at Megan warmly.

      I leaned down to speak to Megan, who was already vigorously shaking her head. ‘Do you want to play here for a minute, Meggie?’

      She leaned closer to me, regarding the woman shyly. ‘No, thank you,’ she said, with polite firmness. She clutched my hand tight and looked up at me, her bright hazel eyes clouded with concern. ‘I want to stay with you.’

      ‘Oh, that’s a shame. I have an iPad here,’ the woman said, lifting a thin screen enticingly into sight. ‘I thought you might be able to help Mamma Panda find her babies on Panda Pop.’

      Megan bit her lip and looked at me uncertainly. ‘I won’t be long, Meggie,’ I said brightly. ‘I’ll get Bobbi and then come straight back for you, I promise.’ She nodded, unable to resist a request for help and the lure of technology.

      The tiny glance she threw over her shoulder as she walked away made my heart constrict. I gave her a reassuring wave through the glass and she smiled and waved back, allowing herself to be lifted onto the swivel chair that the receptionist had just vacated. Clare opened an adjacent door and I followed her into a long corridor, the walls decorated with brightly coloured paintings and Star of the Week charts, photos of smiling children beaming as they held the coveted Champion’s Cup.